Colin Tench & That Darn Brazilian Part 1b
Colin Tench…
I met Colin Tench, believe it or not through Friday Night Progressive. I know… Big surprise right. It seems I’ve met so many brilliant artists and musicans through FNP. Thanks Ron, or should I say, King Dusd. But it was inadvertently through Truey, Mark Trueack of United Progressive Fraternity that I had met Colin. It was shortly after the release of my Fun in OuterSpace album, I remember Ron was playing a UPF track and a GorMusik track on his show and I met Mark in the chat room that night, who, later during the show had sent me a private message to see if I’d like to work with him on his Planetary Overload album. I believe the album was in the beginning stages at the time. Now I’m thinking… who is this guy… so in my infinite wisdom I said, "I think we can work something out…" then I did a quick google search of the gentleman and my jaw hit the floor… Good lord, I said, what have I gotten myself into… I was simply stunned he’d asked me to work with him and the Fraternity now knowing the gravity of who he really is… Wow! and… happily and quickly I agreed to work with him before he changed his mind... lol
Shortly there after this Colin Tench fella /comedian popped up on my radar, being a mutual friend with Mark, I became Facebook friends with him. I was intrigued by his personality… thats what drew me in. I'm thinking… I like this guy… What a goof ball… He’s the cool kid. The class clown everybody wants to be friends with because of his infectiously silly personality. Everybody loves him! Whats not to love about him! He was hilarious and witty… Fun to be around and everybody’s best friend, and a Twit in every sense of the word… A Big lovable Twit!
Well a few months had gone by and I was following Colin on Facebook and discovering his awesome music and really getting into it and then, in early 2016, he posted his Brazilian...
Now some of you may know the story, and some may not, but, his Brazilian, or, "The Brazilian" was a 2:20 youtube video snippet of music he had released for a new album he was working on. I spotted it and listened to it and, wow… I heard voices… the music spoke to me instantly. later on, when we’d be working together… he would always laugh at me when I would say that I’m hearing voices again, or ask me “are you hearing voices gordipoos” and then he would happily shout out “Yay!” when I said “Yes! Indeed!” now knowing that his music was talking to me and I had some new ideas for what we were working on… But his Brazilian had spoken to me in a way not all music does and I instantly fell in love with it.
So maybe a week or so went by and I kept going back to that darn Brazilian over and over and over again, it was driving me crazy, I loved it. And then… one late friday night in the wee hours, I did the unthinkable… I ripped his Brazilian off of the internet and put my G String on it! Good gravy I was thinking, should I even be doing this.. this must be illegal… isn’t there a law against this…
I hesitated… I thought about it… then I did it.
Downloaded, I dropped it into my music software, woke up my orchestra and then hit record… Then the magic happened… those voices were speaking to me loud and clear as Tenchimusik hit my ears! So I worked out and recorded those musical voices I was hearing and rapped it up and sent it off to Colin with a note saying… “Colin... Brother.... Don't hate me... I get these little musical voices in my head and they don't go away... so I let them out this time and this is what happened. This is such an absolutely beautiful piece of music you've written, I couldn't resist! I may never make it in the fluffy boots club now, but I came close! Hahaha! Oh and yes... I may have obtained this piece of music using questionable tactics on the interweb ... Enjoy!”
I had went to bed at that point as it was the middle of the night for me, and early morning for him.
Plus I was exhausted from all of my illegal shenanigans that night. So off I went. But when I had gotten up a bit later and had seen he had responded… I cringed at first, hesitating, then hit the message and hoped for the best but... I wasn’t sure what I would read…
Colin’s response immediately blew me away…
Gasp!!! A giant sigh of relief!
"Gord lord!!!!!!!!!!! Just came on and saw this
I am So pleased and have not heard it
It has been in my mind for a while to ask you if you'd like to be on the album
Something tells me you are musically in sync with me
NOW I will go and hear this.
OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I was right!
You just blew my mind
You HAVE to work with me
We should skype
I have pretty much never had such an amazing additione sent to me by anyone
You "get” it
Ha ha!!! I promise that everything I wrote here is a fact. I KNEW before I listened. Then I listened. VERY moving. You nailed it
I really would like to talk when you get time. you are the man!”
Wow!… I never expected ’THAT' as a response. I thought I had, at the least, cooked my goose, or moose if you live in Sweden, Or, even worse, lost a really cool friend. But I was truly honored that he too would want to work with me musically. He immediately sent me all of the Hair in a G-String Suite and more, some of which the orchestra parts had already been done beautifully by another brilliant composer, Steve Gresswell. I was blown away even more by what I was hearing now. I was all to happy to continue where Steve had left off, for it was an awesome start to the album!
Colin was such a brilliant person and musician to know and work with. Working with him was so easy and effortless for me, it just came naturally. I think the key was, we just got each other. Then the work began on "The Hairy G-String" as we joked many times. Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 3b, Part Hammond B3, Part 4, Part 4a, Part 4b, Part 4c, That Brazilian, Moaning Lisa Does The Tango, and the Other Part, you remember right, because I've forgotten already… and so on, and so on! I was writing orchestral bits like crazy trying to keep up with his madness, I was over writing it, giving him more than he needed as surplus to make sure this part or that part was right… and… Colin was on the other end, slicing and dicing, mixing and matching away, putting this part here and that part there, doing the magic he was so good at, making it all perfect. He had once told me that there was enough extra orchestra bits on the cutting room floor for another whole album. I could believe that. I can tell some of them had spilled into his Major Masterpiece album.
Yes! There were many many parts. It was mind boggling at times, sometimes where only one note had been changed for it to be right. And it had to be right or it wasn’t making the cut. And Then! If we loved it and thought it was great, he then sent it to our secret weapon for the final analysis… The Final Word, The Sonianator, Those Wonderful, Beautiful, Magical Ears of Sonia Motu. “Blimey!! If it doesn’t get passed Sonia we’re doomed” He'd say, "it has to be right!” And Sonia would listen and listen and listen some more and then point out all the little things that had been missed or wrong or was just plain noisy! I’d wait patiently for Colin to get back to me with word… not really, it was more like sweating bullets. What the heck were we thinking! But once we got it right and Sonia did her happy bounce dance the pressure was off. We both breathed a sigh of relief because we knew now it was done right… and it was. Beautiful in the end! So, thank you Sonia for making us better musicians by challenging us to do better in anything we did and making the music even better… Colin’s Moto / Motu was always, details details details!
Well… From here you should know the rest of the story, or most of it. If you don’t, you should learn it. Its an amazing story that has lots of twists and turns and involves many people places and things and it comes with the perfect soundtrack for life, Colin's music. This is just my story, a small part of it. There are many many more stories, as he was an incredible friend, person, musician, and mentor to so many people around the world. This I am sure of.
The most poignant of all his musical works to me, is a song he wrote for his Hair in a G-String album, entitled, And So Today. As it is a personal tribute to himself, it is sadly fitting, perfect in every word and every note and every detail as all his music is. He Will live on in us through all of his wonderful music.
But it was that Darn Brazilian that brought Colin and myself together and it has been an absolutely awesome and amazing roller coaster ride in life for the last 2 years working with him on 2 brilliant albums with a brazilian incredible musicians as well!
His music… It speaks to us all. We all hear those voices at times. I am so glad he posted his Brazilian. Would we have ever worked together if he hadn’t? Possibly? Only God Knows! I am glad I didn’t leave it to chance tho. I have truly been blessed in my life to have been a friend and musical partner with Colin Tenchipoos, and that I was able to work with some incredible musicians along the way, with Colin being that one awesome friend that will always have a special place in my heart, and my life. I will always hear his musical voices… I’d like to leave you with a few words from Colin himself. I think it truly defines him in every sense…
"We all have music in us, tho’ nobody knows why. A simple sound, the right note, a magic phrase. That’s what I try to get. That is me!" ...
Colin “William” Tench, 30th May 1954 – 27th December 2017
